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Suzanne Somers Commits Career Suicide on Camera –”I’m Very Happy with Trump… Now My Career is Over!” Watch

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Suzanne Somers is out, loud and proud … she told TMZ that she’s a fan of Trump.

Somers was leaving Hollywood hot spot Madeo over the weekend and was asked about the government shutdown. She said,

I’m happy that the economy is doing so much better… and now my career is over.

(I can hear you asking, “What career?” Her last TV gig was in the ’90s, on the sitcom Step by Step.)

Watch.

(via TMZ)


The First 14-Minutes of All Stars 3 Is Here!

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Earlier todayChad Michaels and Alaska starred in a Handmaid’s Tale parody called The Hennymaid’s Tale that opened up the first couple of minutes of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 3. And now we have ANOTHER treat for you, the full first 14 minutes of the show featuring the queens’ entrance into the workroom, their reactions, and Ru’s exciting  message about the mystery 10th member! Watch below

RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 3 Ru-Meet Your Queens: Thorgy Thor!

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We are counting down the days until the premiere of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 3 on Thursday, January 25th at 8 / 7 c on VH1!

Are you ready? Of course you are, now let’s Ru-meet your queens!

 Welcome your next All Star, Thorgy Thor! This season 8 queen got her start in drag performing as Frank N. Furter in The Rocky Horror Picture ShowAlso, her name was derived from her birth middle name Thor, named after her grandfather.

While we wait for the premiere, let’s get gagged on her iconic Instagram looks!

Happy new year! #tuxedo #2018

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Snow nymph at gas station. @magnushastings

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Redball! #redball

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Are you ready, hunties? There’s more to come!

We are counting down the rest of the All Stars 3 cast leading up to the premiere.

Tune in to the premiere of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 3 on January 25 at 8/ 7 c on VH1.

#BornThisDay: Actor, Jeanne Moreau

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Moreau in “Ascenseur Pour L’échafaud” (1958) via YouTube

 

January 23, 1928Jeanne Moreau:

“Nostalgia is when you want things to say the same. I know so many people staying in the same place. And I think, my God, look at them! They’re death before they die. That’s a terrible risk. Living is risking.”

Moreau was the very essence of French Cinema, French life, and the French attitude. She was famously unsentimental and believed in living in the moment. She did not like the romanticizing and continued celebration of the French New Wave era that she helped define.

A director, screenwriter and singer as well as a stage and screen actor, Moreau was first noticed by movie fans for a series of roles in films considered part of the French New Wave, most famously Jules Et Jim (1962). She made Hollywood films also, including The Last Tycoon (1976) and Orson Welles’ Chimes At Midnight (1965). She was embraced by her gay fans for her work in Querelle (1982) directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder and starring Brad Davis, adapted from a novel by gay writer Jean Genet.

She had that sensual, pouting mouth, Gauloises smoky voice, and her combination of sharp intelligence and smoldering sexuality were embodiment of how we envisioned of a French woman, although she was half English. Her mother, Kathleen Buckley, was a dancer and it was while she was performing at the Folies Bergère in Paris that she met a chef, Anatole Moreau. She became pregnant, they married, and their daughter was born in Montmartre. Moreau:

“I’m very proud of being half English and I think as time passes my best English qualities are more and more visible. I’m pleased I can be outrageous as only the English can be.”

I wonder if outrageous meant being her own woman, expressing her opinions unreservedly and having many well-publicized love affairs.

When she told her father of her acting ambitions, he called her a whore, but her mother supported her, and she entered the Conservatoire National Supérieur d’Art Dramatique when she was 17-years-old. (Moreau’s father only reconciled to his daughter’s profession a few years before he died in 1975.) By the early 1950s she was established on stage and became a major player at the Comédie-Française.

Her stage triumphs included Jean Cocteau’s La Machine Infernale, with Jean Marais; Eliza Doolittle in G.B Shaw’s Pygmalion, directed by Marais; and Maggie in Tennessee William’s Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, directed by Peter Brook, where she was seen by the 25-year-old film director Louis Malle.

Moreau achieved screen stardom only with her 20th film, Malle’s first solo feature, the noir Ascenseur Pour L’échafaud (Elevator To The Gallows) as an actor who represented the spirit of emerging feminism. Her status was consolidated in Malle’s drama Les Amants (The Lovers)  in 1958. The films were controversial; Les Amants was subject of an obscenity case in the U.S. Supreme Court. In 1960, Moreau won the Best Actress prize at the Cannes Film Festival for Peter Brook’s Seven Days… Seven Nights. She won many other awards including a BAFTA Award for Viva Maria! (1965), and the César Award for The Old Lady Who Walked In The Sea (1992).

It was Jules Et Jim that made Moreau an international star. Directed by François Truffaut, the stylish film is set during WW I and is the story of a love triangle between Moreau’s character, Catherine, and friends Jules (Oskar Werner) and Jim (Henri Serre). It remains hugely influential, becoming synonymous with the French New Wave movement and regularly appearing on Best Films Of All Time lists.

 

Moreau, with Henri Serre and Oskar Werner, “Jules Et Jim” (1962), photograph by Ronald Grant

 

She made more than 75 films in a career that lasted six and a half decades. Her final feature film was O Gebo E A Sombra (Gebo And Shadow) in 2012, playing opposite the great Claudia Cardinale. It was directed by Manoel de Oliveira , who was 103-years-old when it was made.

Moreau had strong and lasting friendships with prominent writers: Jean Cocteau, Jean Genet, Henry Miller and Marguerite Duras. She was married to filmmaker Jean-Louis Richard (1949–1964) and then to American film director William Friedkin (1977–1979). Bisexual director Tony Richardson left his wife, Vanessa Redgrave, for her in 1967, but they never married. She also had affairs with Malle and Truffaut, fashion designer Pierre Cardin, and jazz musician Miles Davis.

In Les Amants, Moreau is wonderful as the bored provincial wife finding sexual gratification outside marriage. But, with its nude love scenes, it was one of the causes of the end of her affair with Malle. Moreau:

“Louis could no longer stand to see me as others then saw me, and as only he had seen me until then. I knew that if I played the love scenes just as Louis wanted, he would love me as an actor, but hate me as a woman. I could not play them without betraying him.”

However, they remained good friends for the rest of their lives, and Malle directed Moreau in two further films, Le Feu Follet (1963) and Viva Maria! (1965).

She directed two well-made, rather old-fashioned films, Lumière (1976), which is about life of actors, and The Adolescent (1979), inspired by childhood during the Nazi occupation. In Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s last film, Querelle (1982), based on Genet, she plays a greedy or grasping madame of a brothel, who sings Everybody Kills the Thing He Loves.

In English films, she plays a lesbian in Vicious Circle (1985), an adaptation of Jean-Paul Sartre’s Huis Clos, and in The Clothes In The Wardrobe (1993), she is a free-spirited woman bringing brightness into a dull English family. She also continued to bring her heady combination of passion and intelligence to a new generation of French directors, such as Luc Besson’s Nikita (1990).

Few film actors could compete with Moreau in the longevity of her allure. She plays a witty and lecherous con artist in The Old Lady Who Walks In The Sea (1991), in François Ozon’s Le Temps Qui Reste ( 2005), she is the sympathetic confidante to her dying gay grandson; and in Manoel de Oliveira’s Gebo Et L’Ombre (2012), she delivers in an amusing small role.

In 2016, photograph by Rudy Waks, via youTube

 

She was a good friend of Sharon Stone, who presented an American Academy Of Motion Pictures life tribute to Moreau in 1998. Orson Welles called her “The greatest actress in the world”.

Moreau:

“People, especially women, worry so much about ageing. But I tell you, you look younger if you don’t worry about it. Because beyond the beauty, the sex, the titillation, the surface, there is a human being. And that has to emerge.”

Moreau was 89-years-old when her final credits rolled July 30, 2017.

 

January 23: It’s YOUR Birthday, Bitch!

#QueerQuote: ”I Am a Necessary Part of an Important Search to Which There is No End.” – Keith Haring.

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Keith Haring (1958-1990) was among that first generation of gay men lost in the initial wave of the plague. He was diagnosed with HIV in late 1988, but he continued to produce his art until the very end, when he could hardly hold a pencil or brush. Haring’s bold lines and primitive figures carry poignant messages of vitality and unity.

Famous for his graffiti-inspired drawings, Haring used the city as a canvas making chalk drawings in subway stations and later started exhibiting in museums. His signature images included various dancing figures, a radiant baby, a flying saucer, large hearts and figures with television heads. This recognizable imagery was soon transferred to the paper and canvas, and the unique energy and optimism of his art, as well as the recognizable style consisting of bold lines and bright colors, has provided him a great affection and admiration.

Haring had a specific concept of what art should represent and strongly believing that it is not something that should be owned and sold but belongs to the community, he opened his Pop Shop with affordable items like posters and tee-shirts to make his art widely accessible. Ironic now, when his painting Untitled (1982) sold at auction at Sotheby’s last year for $6,537,500.

Haring’s work is in major private and public collections, including the Museum Of Modern Art (MoMa) and the Whitney Museum in NYC; Los Angeles County Museum Of Art; the Art Institute Of Chicago; the Bass Museum in Miami; Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris; the Ludwig Museum in Cologne; and the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam. He also created a wide variety of public works, including the infirmary at Children’s Village in Dobbs Ferry, New York, and the second-floor men’s room in the LGBTQ Community Center in Manhattan, which was later transformed into an office and is known as the Keith Haring Room.

His legacy has made a lasting impact on late 20th century art and beyond. During his brief career, Haring invented an entire cartoon universe inhabited with crawling children, barking dogs and dancing figures.Haring was just 31-years-old when he left this wretched world in 1990. I cried this morning thinking about him, yet, I have to say that Haring leaves me with a more positive vision for the future.

The Queens of Drag Race Thailand Dance To RuPaul’s ‘Charisma, Uniqueness, Nerve, & Talent’ In This Exclusive Video

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We are so excited for this!

In case you live under a rock and missed this news, Drag Race Thailand is coming. We gave you your first look at the stage and workroom, and now we’re letting you see the new queens dancing to some music.

Not just any old music though, they’re dancing to none other than Charisma, Uniqueness, Nerve, & Talent by RuPaul.

The clip is very Drag Race meets Michael Jackson‘s Black & White music video and we are HERE FOR IT!

Just look at these stills of some of the queens!

SO FIERCE!

WERK, queen!

YAAAAAAAASSSS!

What are you waiting for? Check out the whole teaser featuring all the queens right here!

Stay tuned for more info on how you can watch Drag Race Thailand. But while you wait you can always…

Tune in to RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 3 premiering on Thursday, January 25th at 8/7c on VH1!

#TransformationTuesday: QWERRRKOUT feat. Felony Dodger

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Transformation Tuesday just got a whole lot QTer…New queers featured every week! Tag us, take a pic of us and follow us on Instagram at QWERRRKOUT, and you too could be the next QT! YOU BETTA QWERRRK! (Mx Qwerrrk pic by celebrity photog Santiago Felipe, illustration by Piepke)

Felony Dodger

Age: 29

Location: Los Angeles, California

About:

“Most recently I was a contestant on The Boulet Brothers’ Dragula, Season 2. Since Dragula, I have started a YouTube channel as Felony Dodger. I have a degree in Fine Art. I began doing drag because it mixes sewing, painting, sculpting, singing, performing, and critical thinking. Furthermore, it is art that you can wear on your body. My staple character is an old Hollywood mobster villain. In the future, I will be touring with Dragula and making more YouTube videos. I encourage everyone to watch the video titled ‘Smut’ (below). It is a tribute to the freedom of pleasure…a right which is not guaranteed by the constitution.”

Instagram: felonydodger

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Meet the Drag Race Thailand Queens

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The Drag Race Thailand queens have been announced and we are so excited about it! Are YOU ready to meet your queens?!  Here’s your fast track introduction to all the amazing competitors coming to Drag Race Thailand.

Stay tuned for more information but  Drag Race Thailand  will be coming to WOW Presents Plus!

Now enjoy the queens…

First up, B Ella !!!!

Check out Minnie Minaj!!!

Slay, Morrigans!!! SLAY!

Introducing Amadiva!!

Welcome, Natalia Piarcam!

Check out, Bunny Be Fly!

Annee Maywong!

Petchara!

JAJA!

 

Dearie Doll!

And your hosts… Art-Arya and Pangina Heals!

 

Don’t worry, hennies! You’ll have a chance to watch outside of Thailand on WOW Presents Plus! So be on the lookout!

#DownInTheDM: Mx Qwerrrk Hams w/ BIANCA DEL RIO, New Show & Book “Blame It On Bianca Del Rio” (Q&A)

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THEEEE queen of comedy, winner of RuPaul’s Drag Race, Season 6, Bianca Del Rio is about to hit the road again with her current show Blame It On Bianca Del Rio. After the HUGE success of her previous shows The Rolodex of Hate and Not Today Satan, the insult comic, who describes her style as “Very Joan Crawford/Bozo”,  continues to kill it with her acerbic wit, insightful commentaries, and unabashed lambasting of pretty much everything and everyone…yeah…she’s kinda got an opinion! WOWlebrity Mx Qwerrrk caught up with Miss Del Rio right before she’s off to South America for a couple shows, and then her MEGA road trip across the U.S.A.. Check out their chat from QwerrrkOut below, about boys, assorted baloney, Donald Trump, and her new no-HOES-barred book Blame It On Bianca Del Rio: The Expert on Nothing with an Opinion on Everything (out May 29)…and get your tix HERE for her live show NOW…cause they ALWAYS sell out! (pic by Denise Malone)

 

Mx Qwerrrk: Fave insult comic of all time?

Bianca: I love Don Rickles. He’s my ultimate! But, I love that side of Joan Rivers when would attack people.

Funniest drag queen, besides yourself?

Lady Bunny is retarded, in a good way! Jackie Beat, Sherry Vine, Varla Jean Merman and Coco Peru are all brilliantly funny. They know what they’re doing. It’s not some random bullshit, a lip sync or some death drop. It’s something you have to think about…which is something that’s missing from our drag scene today.

Fave nu school drag queen?

Myra DuBois, in London. She’s a rotted, hateful, nasty queen that makes me piss myself laughing! For the past few years, she’s opened for me when I’m in the UK.

Best place to see a drag queen in the wild?

Oh God…I never go out anymore! Maybe YouTube is the place to find them now…’cause you can’t rely on Instagram…because that’s a BIG FUCKING LIE! They look gorgeous in a photo, and HIDEOUS in person! And if you really wanna see their talents…XTUBE!!!

Best eyelash brand?

I order mine wholesale from E Eyelash…in bulk…as you can see.

Fave IG page?

Dublin_zoetrope. He does all this hateful stuff about Meryl Streep and Glenn Close..anything Hollywood or theater related…from Patti LuPone to Bernadette Peters. It makes me chuckle. If you’re a real fag, you’ll get it.

Fave RuPaul’s Drag Race season?

Past seasons 4, 5 and 6, I get very blurry. I don’t know who’s from what season, or what year it was. After I did the show…I have no fucking idea! Anytime you see Shangela, you’re like ‘What fucking season is this?’…I feel like I’m having a stroke! I loved Sharon Needles’ season (Season 4). She changed the game. It was also fun to see Jinkx Monsoon (Season 5) navigate through the process.

Best way to tame one’s inner saboteur?

I drink!!! That’s what fixes all my problems. People get wrapped up in their heads too much. Being now 42, the shit that bothered me doesn’t bother me anymore. I laugh at social media. Do you honestly think I fucking care?!?! You think somebody’s going to school me, on my page, about what I need to do with MY LIFE? I’m a man in a wig, doing comedy. It’s not fucking brain surgery!

What kind of boys do you like?

Looking at my past, I don’t have a type. Each one of my exes are very different..and I’ve only had three! I had a relationship two years ago, for a few months, that didn’t go well. I’ve been single for about 10 years. It’s worked out well for me. If I were in a relationship, I wouldn’t be able to do the things that I do. People are a little scared of me in general. I’m not that welcoming. I’m not evoking sexual appeal. With Detox and Adore Delano, people gravitate to them…they find them a little less threatening.

Did you really have a friend who shit in a date’s bed, then called you for help?

It’s TRUE!!! He was VERY upset when he found out. He didn’t know it was in the show. He was in the audience in a New York Show. I didn’t think that he would be there. My friend, that I originally told the story to, knew that he was there…which only made it funnier.

What’s different about this new show?

This show is me discussing things that I’m constantly blamed for. I have several friends who are usually sweet, and kind, and normal; but when they get around me, they say hateful and nasty things…and they say, ‘Oh my God, it’s you…you just bring it out in me!’ It’s scenarios that have happened in the world that I can easily blame myself for. I’ll take the blame. Unlike Trump, I’ll own it!

Is your forthcoming book an extension of the show?

It’s completely different. When I was approached to do a book, I didn’t want to do it about myself. My life is not that interesting…and I think it’s awfully egotistical to do a book about yourself…that’s fucking DUMB! So, I thought to do a help book. People always ask questions, and for my opinion, on social media…why not make it funny, and give my true, gut instincts and response. It’s not for the light-hearted. It’s hard truths, in a comedic way. GO EAT A FUCKING TIDE POD!!!

 

Has the current PC climate altered your act?

Not at all! Everybody now is a spiritual advisor. Like these people on IG who are completely naked, with a spiritual caption underneath the pic. It’s fucking HYSTERICAL! You’re a self-centered, fucking faggot who went to the gym and wants to show your fucking body…OWN IT, BITCH!!! I would have much more respect for that, than to say, ‘There needs to me more peace and unification in the world’. WE KNOW THAT MOTHERFUCKER!!! But, we don’t need to see you in your fucking panties to do it! That’s the world we live in. Everybody’s trying to do good. If you state your opinion, then you’re dividing the country. NO!!! We can have an opinion. It can be a heated discussion. There is no right or wrong in this. If people don’t have conversations, and maybe get offended for a minute, is anything gonna change? I don’t owe anybody ANYTHING!!! If you don’t like it, change the channel, don’t buy a ticket, don’t look at me.

Message to Donald Trump?

There’s never been a more REPULSIVE human being that I’ve ever witnessed in my life! It’s sad that he’s in charge of our country. He doesn’t belong in politics. He has no idea what he’s doing. He’s a national embarrassment! How do you expect him the run the White House?…he can’t even get his fucking hair right! He can’t find one, sensible fag to fix that FUCKING HAIR!!!

Do you need a pretty pig for your opening act? I can tap dance, Dab & ham it up!

Perfect! I LOVE IT!!!

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Britney Spears Takes ‘Piece of Me’ Vegas Show Around the Globe

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Big day today for Britney Spears fans. The Pop icon fresh off her Las Vegas residency announced that Britney: Piece of Me is hitting the road!

Britney told the world via Instagram that the award winning tour would hit select cities in North America, Europe and the UK!

In honor of this gift the queen has bestowed upon us, let’s take a look back at some her most ICONIC music videos.

PIECE OF ME

Bring in the bobbed clones! The tour’s namesake will surely get you in the mood to take on the world.

TOXIC

Enough said, this jam still makes every Judy want to join the mile high club.

I’M A SLAVE 4 U

Shedding her pigtails for something a little more sexy, Britney left her mark on the pop world with snakes and low rise jeans.

STRONGER

Chair dance. Chair dance. Chair dance.

Sometimes

Let’s close out with some classic 90s-all-white-zumba-pants-crop-top-blowing-in-the-wind realness.  The best of bubblegum pop!

 

Content via Youtube & Instagram.

 

RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 3 Ru-Meet Your Queens: Trixie Mattel

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We are counting down the days until the premiere of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 3 TOMORROW, January 25th at 8 / 7 c on VH1!

Are you ready? Of course you are, now let’s Ru-meet your queens!

Welcome your next All Star, Trixie Mattel! This season 7 has kept very busy the last few month’s starring in  The Trixie and Katya Show on VICELAND.  Be sure to check out the new episode tonight at 10 pm! She also previously starred with Katya on UNHhhh on WOW Presents.

While we wait for the premiere, let’s get gagged on her iconic Instagram looks!

Trixie and Katya Show returns January 24th! On @viceland

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Europe! “MOVING PARTS” in Jan/Feb!

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Are you ready, hunties? There’s more to come!

Tune in to the premiere of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 3 on January 25 at 8/ 7 c on VH1.

#BornThisDay: Ancient Hottie, Hadrian

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Hadrian, British Museum Archives

 

January 24, 76- Hadrian

He was a bigot and he built a huge wall, but he was gay and he loved his men. He was born Publius Aelius Hadrianus in Italica, in what is now Spain. When he 41-years-old he became, the third of the Five Good Roman Emperors (not an a cappella group), after the death of his cousin Trajan.

His reign was marked by a time of relative peace, except for that darn second Roman-Jewish War, after which he became violently Anti-Semitic. Even without constantly being at war, Hadrain was able to extend the Roman Empire from North Africa to Northern England, Portugal to Persia.

There is a wall that bears his name at the border of Scotland and England, made to keep out those dangerous immigrants. Hadrian had no intention of letting anyone in, not even Norwegians. He was big on infrastructure, and oversaw several colossal building projects in his lifetime, including The Pantheon, which he rebuilt after a fire destroyed the original, and what was once the largest temple in Roma, The Temple Of Venus. He was a real job creator.

He traveled all over the known world, but he rarely saw his wife, Vibia Sabina, a former model. It was okay though, he much preferred the culture of Athens instead of Rome, embracing a love of young men. His greatest love was Antinous, whom he met as a 14-year-old in Turkey. After Antinous drowned in the River Nile at 19-years-old, Hadrian’s tributes to him included having him deified, founding a city near where the boy drowned and naming it Antinopolis, commissioning 2,000 naked or partially clothed statues of the beautiful teenager for display throughout the empire, building a temple to him at his swanky palace in Tivoli, and put Antonous’ likeness on money, the only non-Roman Emperor ever honored with his face on a coin.

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Antinous, Britich Museum Archives

 

The Cult Of Antinous was extremely popular with a certain kind of guy throughout the Roman Empire and it flourished until it was condemned for being based on an “immoral relationship” and was suppressed by the new Catholic Church. Hadrian had no children, but in his final year, he adopted a 51-year-old muscle daddy and renamed him Antoninus Pius, just so he could have an heir.

Hadrian inherited the Roman Empire at its apex, when it prospered on a policy of endless expansion and conquests.

The first thing he did, within hours of his coronation, was to withdraw Roman troops from Mesopotamia (now Iraq), and fortify the Empire’s boundaries by building that huge wall in Northern England and others too, one in the Danube Valley and one along the Rhine.

Hadrian was no ordinary emperor; he was openly, flamboyantly gay. To the dismay of many Romans, Antinous, accompanied him on his journeys around the Empire. There are still many artifacts to tell their story, including a poem written on papyrus, featuring the two men hunting together, and recent finds of memorials to him at Hadrian’s penthouse in Tivoli.

It was not uncommon in that era for a powerful man to have a male lover and a wife. He had to marry; he had a politically arranged marriage to Sabina, who was his great-niece and his second cousin, just so he could set up his succession. But, it was a sexless marriage and it produced no children. Hadrian was unique because he made his love “official” in a way that no other Emperor ever had; by publicly deifying him. I wish that my husband would declare me a god!

Hadrian’s gayness was by no means the only unusual aspect of his reign. The decision to pull his troops out of Mesopotamia was frowned upon in an Empire that had built its might on an aggressive foreign policy, but Hadrian’s charisma and classic Roman good-looks won over the citizens. There are similarities between second-century Mesopotamia and present-day Iraq, with the Roman occupiers finding themselves in a hotbed of violence, resistance and religious extremism. It had just been conquered by his predecessor and there was a lot of guerrilla warfare, which is eerily just like today. Hadrian was a very experienced military leader, but he was also very cultured, a lover of music and art, and he had a Greek identity that set him apart from most Romans.

He was known as “The People’s King”. He traveled with his troops and ate the same rations. Among his legacies, he laid the foundations of the Byzantine Empire and he changed the name of Judea to Palestine. But, at times, Hadrian’s Rome had to play the role of violent occupier. During the suppression of a Jewish rebellion in Judea, Roman warriors were dispatched to take control of the region, killing 600,000 Jews. It is possible that as a punishment for the uprising, he changed the name of Judea to Palestine.

A bronze head of Hadrian was discovered in the Thames in 1834, and in 2008, the British Museum allowed it travel to both ends of Hadrian’s Wall as part of a special exhibit. The head comes from a statue that was erected in a public square in London 122 AD to commemorate Hadrian’s first visit to Britain.

Antinopolis was a beautiful city named for a beautiful young man. It was filled with white marble temples, monuments and streets laid out on a grid pattern and adorned with hundreds of images of Antinous, now a god. A giant arch welcomed travelers arriving by boat at the marble docks. Broad streets with expensive boutiques and sumptuous condos led to a central intersection, where a colossal gilded statue of Antinous “coming forth” towered above the square. A north-south boulevard was matched by another going east-west which ran the length of the city, linking the Tomb of Antinous at one end with the Boylesque Theater at the other. Outside the city walls, on a dusty plain, was an enormous Hippodrome that dominated the view.

Hadrian directed that cities throughout the Empire would hold festivals and games to commemorate Antinous. In addition to the statues and busts of Antinous (more than 100 still survive), countless reliefs, medals, cameos and gems were crafted to honor Hadrian’s young lover. Private shrines dedicated to Antinous sprang from Britain to North Africa. Priests of Antinous were appointed to perform the ceremonies that would perpetuate his memory for all eternity.

The competitors in the Antonous Games were young men called “Ephebes”. The festivals included swimming and boat races in the Nile, but the Antinous Games were unique because they included competition in the Arts also. The big winner was consecrated as the living embodiment of Antinous and given special Antinopolis citizenship, with an all-expenses-paid-for life of adoration. He worshiped in the temple as the representative of Antinous, the essence of youth and masculinity. This image of Antinous was the last great ancient type of young male perfection, and his cult lasted for several hundred years, well into the Christian era.

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Hadrian and Antinous Together Forever, via Blueboy Magazine

Hadrian died in the year 138 AD, taken by a broken heart at 62-year-old. In 218 AD, the Roman Emperor Elagabalus married a man named Zoticus, a hot jock from Smyrna, in a lavish public ceremony in Rome, amid much public celebration.

When the Empire was ultimately overrun by Muslims,  Antinopolis was abandoned and vanished from history. When the ruins of were discovered in 1798 by Napoleon’s team of archaeologists, 1,500 statues of Antinous were discovered. They found over half a million jars containing offerings to his shrine. Unfortunately, the ruins of Antinopolis were lost forever in the early 19th century when an Egyptian construction company ground most of the city’s remaining pillars for cement.

However, the story of Hadrian and Antinous was inadvertently preserved by the Catholic Church in The Vatican’s documents denouncing paganism. The beautiful sculptures and images of Antinous were carefully buried underground by their fans to protect them from destruction. Hundreds of years later, the statues were unearthed and hailed as magnificent treasures. Some are currently displayed in The Vatican, Louvre, The British Museum and Fitzwilliam and Altes Museum in Berlin.

Frederick The Great Of Prussia, whose gayness failed to be eliminated by harsh treatment by his father, copied Hadrian’s palace at Tivoli when he built his own villa, the Sans Souci. Frederick used busts of Antinous as a subtle code for his own gay desires.

Hadrian’s villa at Tivoli is now a landfill, although there is a campaign through the United Nations’ UNESCO to preserve the ruins. Today, what remains of Antinopolis is now called El Sheikh Ibada, a small village surrounded by a few crumbled ruins of what was once a beautiful city of gay worship. There is a Church of The Sacred Cultus of Antinous in Hollywood, and a gay strip club in Fort Lauderdale, Hadrian’s.

January 24: It’s YOUR Birthday, Bitch!

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#WhatTimeIsIt?: The Ticking Clock Says Now Mueller Is Coming For Trump…

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CNN is reporting that special counsel Robert Mueller‘s investigation may be nearing an end. Former Trump campaign aide Rick Gates just added a Tom Green, prominent white-collar attorney, a signal that this might be a new approach to his not-guilty plea.

Gates pleaded not guilty in October to 8 charges of money laundering as well as not registering as a foreign lobbyist. Former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort, also pleaded not guilty to 9 counts in the same case.

The current FBI Director Christopher Wray has threatened to quit after coming under pressure from Attorney General Jeff Sessions, to get rid of senior leadership figures dating from the Comey era, like deputy Andrew McCabe, that Trump believes are biased against him. The Washington Post is reporting that Trump demanded loyalty from not just Comey,

Shortly after President Trump fired his FBI director in May, he summoned to the Oval Office the bureau’s acting director for a get-to-know-you meeting.

The two men exchanged pleasantries, but before long, Trump, according to several current and former U.S. officials, asked Andrew McCabe a pointed question: Whom did he vote for in the 2016 election?

McCabe said he didn’t vote, according to the officials, who, like others interviewed for this article, spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk candidly about a sensitive matter.

Trump, the officials said, also vented his anger at McCabe over the several hundred thousand dollars in donations that his wife, a Democrat, received for her failed 2015 Virginia state Senate bid from a political action committee controlled by a close friend of Hillary Clinton.

Looks like a pattern, no?

Mueller’s requests suggest that he is going about the investigation in a methodical way, working his way from the lowest people on the list to the key figure, Trump, at the top of a rather large triangle.

Trump has said that he would be “100 percent” willing to testify to Mueller under oath. CNN has reported that some of Trump’s friends have warned him NOT to voluntarily submit to an interview.

And the wagons seem to be circling with all of these new revelations in the press. According to CNN,

The fact that Mueller’s team has already spoken to Comey and Sessions and now wants to talk to the President suggests the investigation into whether Trump obstructed justice by asking the former FBI director to go easy on former national security adviser Michael Flynn and then fired him when he demurred, is at an advanced stage. CNN also reported last week that Trump’s former top political adviser Steve Bannon had struck a deal to be interviewed by Mueller’s prosecutors.

It seems to indicate that the investigation is in its 11th hour,” said Jens David Ohlin, a professor and vice dean at Cornell Law School.

Ohlin said the seniority of those questioned points to Mueller reaching a defining moment at least in the obstruction of justice portion of an investigation that is also considering whether anyone in the Trump campaign broke the law by cooperating with a Russian election meddling effort.

We are at the top of the heap politically with Steve Bannon. We are at the top of the heap in terms of law enforcement in terms of the attorney general and the former head of the FBI,” said Ken Cuccinelli, Virginia’s former Republican attorney general.

It strikes me they are getting near the end of gathering all their information, and then … they are going to have to process that and make some decisions about how to proceed,” Cuccinelli told CNN.

Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said yesterday that the White House is still “fully cooperative” with Mueller but believes that people are ready to move on. But a new CNN poll finds that 8 in 10 people said Trump should testify to Mueller if asked, including 59% of Republicans.

Innocent people have nothing to be afraid of, right? Only witches are afraid of witch hunts.


(Photo, YouTube; via CNN, The Washington Post)


The NY Times Asks, “Is RuPaul’s Drag Race the Most Radical Show on TV?” (Yass!)

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Jenna Wortham wrote a headline grabbing story, just out, for the New York Times. It starts out, setting the stage…

“On a soundstage deep in the hills of Los Angeles one morning last August, RuPaul Charles and several drag queens made their way to a set that had been transformed into a simulacrum of the reality-TV show “The Bachelor.” Lacy strands of lights dripped down plastic boxwood hedges, and a row of white fluted columns framed a velvety red strip of carpet. A hot tub bubbled quietly in a corner. The contestants arranged themselves onto a set of bleachers to be appraised by the dashing bachelor, who in this scene was played by the actor Jeffrey Bowyer-Chapman, best known for his role on the Lifetime television drama “UnREAL.” They were filming the latest season of the reality competition show “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” and the day’s challenge was meant to showcase the competitors’ acting abilities. The challenge, called “The Bitchelorette,” was a parody of the farcical dynamics that play out on “The Bachelor” each season. The goal was not to win Bowyer-Chapman’s heart but rather to see who could perform — satirize, really — stereotypes of femininity with enough humor to impress the judges.”

She writes, a bit into the story,

“Throughout my conversations with Charles, I got the sense that he is a sensitive person who is actively trying to evolve with the times. ‘Every season the girls come and they challenge me. A new nose contour technique or a new way to see themselves and identity, and it helps me stay on my game and stay engaged in the conversation.‘ Last season, midway through the show, a queen in her late 30s named Peppermint revealed she was transgender, the first time being trans became a significant part of a character’s narrative arc. Peppermint talked openly about her transition with Charles and the other contestants. Peppermint had auditioned twice for the show, and she didn’t mention her transness. ‘I was always careful to separate my trans identity from my drag career,’ she told me in a phone conversation. When she finally made it onto the show, she was asked if she would feel comfortable speaking about it. She has gorgeous features and deep dimples, but on the show, she described how her figure and hair, which were perceived as masculine, invited critiques from people who felt she should transition further or appear more feminine. ‘I came to terms with my womanhood, even if I naturally have a beard growing in,’ she said. ‘Men don’t own gender and gender performance. We all can turn gender on its head.

It’s really a fantastic piece and you should just read the entire thing here and/or get a copy of the Sunday New York Times magazine this weekend.

And don’t forget RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars premieres Thursday night on VH1.

(Photo, Graeme Mitchell; via The New York Times)

Some of the Best (& Worst) Google Arts & Culture Celebrity Doppelgängers…

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Google’s new app, Google Arts & Culture (available at the App Store for FREE) has zoomed to the top of the iTunes charts and everybody, including stars, is hooked on it. (I’m not equating myself with celebs, but mine is left. Hey, at least I’m a Queen.)

So, you just take a selfie and the facial recognition software then matches your puss with a look-alike artwork. If gives you a few matches in case the first ones are insulting.

Some stars have taken to sharing their matches on Instagram & Twitter. As you can see, gender flies out the window, so that’s progressive. Josh Groban was “not mad at it”, but Alyssa Milano told Google to “fuck off.” Minnie Driver match is a “Scream”, and as she says, Sarah Silverman‘s is “UnCANNY”.

Who did you get? Post yours on our Facebook here.

Guys, this app is DEAD ON.

A post shared by kristen bell (@kristenanniebell) on

I’m not mad at it

A post shared by Josh Groban (@joshgroban) on

Portrait of a boy 👦😂

A post shared by Kate Hudson (@katehudson) on

It does feel like summer today

A post shared by Amanda Seyfried (@mingey) on

#blessed

A post shared by Zach Braff (@zachbraff) on

Fuck off, Google.

A post shared by Alyssa Milano (@milano_alyssa) on

I win?

A post shared by Busy Philipps (@busyphilipps) on

#sunday

A post shared by Min (@driverminnie) on

UnCANNY

A post shared by @ sarahkatesilverman on

(Photos, Instagram; via Vogue, Digital Trends)

RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 11 is Now Casting, Mama Ru Wants You

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Grab your wigs, perfect your tucks and get ready to WERK!

RuPaul’s Drag Race is officially casting for a season 11. If you have what it takes to be America’s next drag superstar head over to RuPaul’s Drag Race Casting.

All the details are on RDRCasting.com so be sure to read them carefully. You don’t want to miss your shot!

So fill out an application and send us your most Dragtastic video!

The deadline is Friday, March 9th. So you better hurry, hennies.

January 24th: It’s YOUR Birthday, Bitch!

#HumpDayHotties: Fischerspooner’s New Video, “TopBrazil” Will Heat Up Your Winter. Watch

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Fischerspooner‘s latest video, directed By: Tom C. J. Brown (and produced by Michael Stipe) is TopBrazil and according to the press release it…

Celebrates a pop aesthetic typically reserved for the female archetype and liberates the male form to be sexual, expressive and fearless.

And as the lyrics describe, it sounds kinda like dirty fun, not to mention catchy…

I’m not opposed to humiliation
I hold my breath until
I wiggle out of a bad position
I call it topBrazil
T-O-P-B-R-A-Z-I-L (take it)(take it)(take it all the way)

OK. We’re in. Sir.

Watch.

Fischerspooner’s Upcoming West Coast Tour Dates are:
March 14th – Regency Ballroom – San Francisco, CA
March 15th – The Fonda Theatre – Los Angeles, CA
March 16th – The Observatory, Santa Ana, CA

You can get tickets here.

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